Two newcomers to Riverfall find themselves acquainted through a skill they both share.

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Built into the cliffs overlooking the Suvan Sea, Riverfall resides on the edge of grasslands of Cyphrus where the Bluevein River plunges off the plain and cascades down to the inland sea below. Home of the Akalak, Riverfall is a self-supporting city populated by devoted warriors. [Riverfall Codex]

There was a sort of power to be enjoyed from sitting atop a man, barbarian or otherwise, and commanding him from above. Her weight on his hips had nearly locked his body in place. Her knees had thwarted any basic escape attempts. There would be no threat endured from the sort of rolling boys in the Training Yard might've pulled like a threatened alligator in the Kandukta Basin. No. This barbarian stranger was right where she wanted him. Her fist was soaring down like a stone prepared to crush against her opponent's face. And from her throne she hoped the Akalak instructor was watching her impending victory with his keen, disciplined stare. With luck, Goddess Queen Myri would be doing just the same. Little did she know they were about to be privy to an entirely different sort of show.

Her opponent's ingenuity continued to shine as he arched upward to hide away from a more damaging, longer ranged attack. He kept her arm imprisoned with an iron-like vice. His fingers lacing through her hair to take a hold of it was a trick visibly dirtier than those employed by the Akalak fighters around them. Yet he did not give her head a vicious yank backward as she had anticipated such a move was designed for. In fact, none of his movements thus far were truly designed to bring her the deserved pain that should've befallen her from the start. His counter was far more dangerous than anything she could've predicted. The battle-readiness left his stare and something softer replaced it. Her body tensed. What is he planning? Then she felt his soft lips press against hers.

They were warm and their movements smooth, purposeful and yet tender. There was no longer an imposing room of colorful, statuesque men. Instead there existed only the two locking lips in the entire world...them and the alarming dialogue taking place in the Myrian girl's mind. His palm cupped her cheek and she could feel the inclination to move closer due to the arm wrapped skillfully about her waist. Her liberated left arm was free to wrap beneath his to reach his mid-back. There her fingers were free to feel the heat from his skin beneath his shirt, tips resting upon the natural contour that dipped in toward his spine. Her other hand abandoned the combative fist so that she might let it find the nape of his neck.

Her eyes, which she only then realized had instinctively closed at the gesture while her busy mind processed the unfathomable turn of events, flashed open as her fingers laced themselves through his strange, platinum-blonde locks. It was in that moment she gathered that she had been defeated at a game she never realized she had been playing. Her brow furrowed with perplexity and hot anger flashed in her eyes. Her fingers curled into a ball about his hair, and just as the boisterous chuckling of the Akalaks in the training center reached her ears, she pulled back and simultaneously wrenched his head backward with a feral growl.

The intrusive thoughts became louder in their separation. Is that what a woman truly is in this world? Is it really as the elders say? A woman can't have so much as a real spar across the Suvan Sea without quickly being objectified on the mat? The chief instructor must've seen the homicide in her gaze. Just as she went to lunge toward his throat with her teeth like a jaguar, she found herself being dragged like an unruly beast from the object of her righteous fury. All the while her wild, belligerent gaze was focused on her prior opponent as a stream of foreign obscenities poured from her lips.

The senior Akalak tossed her down where she had come and halted her next forward lunge past him with an extended arm. "No! You go cool off. Don't take another step back into my training space until you do, savage," he threatened with a single finger pointed in her face. Any Akalak that had been fully focused on their sparring had certainly ceased their training to watch the unfolding show by then. Kaie peered over her shoulder to eye her opponent one last time before she relented, gathered her things, and stormed from the establishment with an awful energy of raw emotion coursing like wildfire in her veins.

The first of your threads I get to grade, and quite an enjoyable one. I took the liberty to award lores about the respective other despite the fact that no names were dropped since this is a flashback and I know the two of you will recognize each other and remember the incident later. I also saved myself (and you) the trouble of listing injuries that would heal without a trace and not be worth a memory in present time. Apologies to Kaie for sparse skills, you simply are too skilled at tactics and unarmed combat to gain much here.

Please remember to edit your grade request to reflect that this grade has been seen to!If there are questions about the grades, please contact me via PM.